This year’s event proved to be one of the most challenging since its inception due to the torrential rain and thunderstorm between 5.30 and 6.30pm. An inspection of the course took place at 6.45pm which showed a number of areas of flooding and in particular, a section of New Road completely under water. We delayed the start and reinspected the course at 7.10pm. Most of the flooded areas had cleared apart form a New Road section of 30 metres which had improved but was still under water. With a lead car on the first leg which would allow safe access of that section, and very little traffic on the road, it was decided that we go ahead as the situation would improve throughout the race if there was no more rain.
Unfortunately, the bad weather impacted on some of the baton chips, which meant that around 13 teams had no results. We were able to use the video of the finish line to sort the results for some of the teams, but due to athletes blocking the camera view in the finish area, not all the teams could be identified. As a result, the following teams could not be included in the results:
16 Kimberworth Striders
59 Steel City Striders
114 Kimberworth Striders
119 Rotherham Harriers
142 Denby Dale AC
We will continue to examine the video footage to see if we can identify any of the above teams and add them to the results. However, we do need to publish the official results soon, once we are satisfied that they are as accurate as possible.
The Dam Flask Relays are popular due to the atmosphere that’s created in the village and particularly round the start/finish area. However, that can impact on the results as is evidenced in this year’s event. I can only apologise to those teams whose results we couldn’t get.
We will be thanking Bradfield Fellowship Cricket Club for hosting us once again, and in recognition of their bar takings being significantly down on previous years, we will be making a donation to the club and their defibrillator appeal.
I’d like to thank our members and former members who helped with the car parking directions in the worst of the weather, all of whom were thoroughly soaked, and then picked up marshalling duties for the race.
We will be back once again next year, with a proposed date of Tuesday 17th June 2025.
Mike Levery
Chair
Sheffield Running Club
Damflask Relays Results 2024